By the time we stop to rest and eat, breathing has become difficult.
The heavy scent in the air is overpowering, a combination of burned ash and fresh blood. The sky has remained dark, so it’s impossible to know if it’s daytime or the middle of the night.
All I know is that I’m exhausted.
Even Thaden seems to be struggling with his breathing, using gestures instead of words to indicate where we should lay our furs.
“Safe here,” he rasps, minimizing his speech while he indicates the bare stretch of blackened rock, not a hint of a dead leaf or branch in sight. “Should reach village tomorrow.”
I want to ask him if he anticipates we’ll get there in the morning or later, but my mouth is too dry to speak. Sipping water does nothing to help, and worse, our water supplies are running low.
My power is keeping me going.
But it’s also a danger.
Within the breeze is the samepullI experienced when I reached out to Thaden.
I drop to my unrolled fur and extend my right hand into the wind. The air changes direction, swirling around my fingers, circling faster like its own little storm?—
I snap my fist closed and lower my arm.
Gallium gives me a grimace. The wind plucks at his hand where he grips his hammer and at his arm where the medallions are nestled. He folds his arms firmly across his chest when he sits down, but he’s forced to unfold them when I hand him food to eat.
He stares at it before he nibbles the edge of the apple-like fruit, barely touching it.
I understand his reluctance to eat. Our bodies are working hard, running on power alone. The thought of swallowing food… I’m sure I’ll only bring it up again.
We’re caught now in a dilemma with no good outcomes.
Without our power, our bodies would be stretched beyond their limits, and we’d face collapse. With our power, we’re becoming targets for the environment.
I leave my medallions where they are nestled around my arm and take careful bites of the apple that Gallium hands back to me. I can’t eat much more than he did.
After that, I offer to take the first watch—a suggestion that basically consists of me tapping my chest and saying, “First.”
I’m surprised when Thaden doesn’t argue. His shoulders are hunched, and the rings under his eyes are darker. He finishes the apple-like fruit he was eating, core and all, gives me a nod, and then lies down on his fur with his back to me.
Gallium is slower to agree, but it doesn’t take him long to reach for his fur, pull it over himself, and close his eyes, facing me, his eyelids slowly closing.
It’s only once they’re both asleep that I realize we didn’t agree on who would take the second watch, but it’s the least of my concerns.
When the wind dies down, I can hear more clearly the sounds from the distant plain.
A mournful call.
A soft cry.
A high-pitched shriek cut short, and then another eerie call.
And within all of the sounds, a rhythmic clanging that takes me back to the day my people died. Students were hammering their medallions out in the wasteland. My mother’s commands cut through the air, carrying the force of her power.
“Forge!”she screamed.“You will forge until your hands bleed and your muscles break!”
I pull my knees to my chest, wrapping my arms around them.
I never forged my own medallions. Was never given my own hammer. Instead, my power was taken.
But it came back. It resurged.
